Warren Murphy - Dr Quake

They sat stretched beneath a poplar tree, rubbing their bare feet into the soil. Wyatt reached the top of the hill puffing.

"It's all here. Feinstein's giving us trouble."

"Nobody gives us trouble," one girl said. "They give you trouble. They don't give us trouble."

Wyatt dropped the bag and fought for breath.

"Feinstein is giving him trouble," one girl told the other.

"Piggy always has trouble with liberals," the second girl said.

"Don't laugh, girls ... I mean, women. He's going to squeal to the feds in Washington."

"Then shoot him."

"Add another notch to your gun," the second girl said.

"I can't just shoot him."

"Well, how else would you kill someone, pig?"

"Piggy, piggy, pig, pig. Piggy's afraid to shoot his big bad gun."

"Is all the money there?" the first girl asked.

"Yeah. But Feinstein's going to Washington to squeal."

"Well, stop him somehow. You've got all these notches on your gun for something."

"I can't kill him," Wyatt said.

"Then we're going to have to," one of the girls said.

"That's murder," Wyatt said.

"So's Vietnam."

"We could go to the gas chamber for murder," Wyatt said.

"You can be killed walking across the street, piggy-"

"That quake thing ... could it really snap off the entire fault? Could California go into the Pacific?" Wyatt asked.

"You can't make an omelette without breaking eggs, Piggy."

"Can you control it?" Wyatt inquired.

"Worry, you pig bastard. Worry."

"I'm worrying."

"Good. You should," said both girls in unison. Then they outlined what Sheriff Wyatt should do about Feinstein. And they told him what they would do when Feinstein got back.

"Do you have to?" asked Wyatt.

"Do you want to go to jail?"

"Maybe you could poison him or stab him or something?" Wyatt said.

The girls shook their heads.

"He really isn't such a bad guy," Wyatt said. "I mean, not that bad."

Then they divided the money. Wyatt got one tenth. But he was assured he would get a hundred times that when things really got going.

"I wouldn't do this just for the money," said Wyatt.

"Then give the money back, piggy," one of the girls said.

Wyatt didn't.

CHAPTER FIVE

Later that day, Harris Feinstein kept the appointment he had been able to wangle with the assistant secretary of the Department of the Interior. He found out that the assistant secretary had examined his case and forwarded it to the proper department.

What department was that? asked Feinstein.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation, answered the woman.

Feinstein checked in at a hotel. He had not planned on staying the evening. The next morning, he went to FBI headquarters. Yes, they had received a referral from the Interior Department but could not make heads or tails of it. Some cheating on insurance?

No, said Harris Feinstein. And he was questioned about his background and asked about troubles with his wife.

What troubles? Feinstein asked.

"Sheriff Wyatt back in San Aquino says you've been having troubles with your wife lately and he'd appreciate it and the whole town would appreciate it if we would not hold any funny talk against you. We have checked with several leading citizens and they all vouch that you are harmless. I'm afraid, Mr. Feinstein, your friends are worried that you might get hurt. There are some excellent doctors in Washington. You might want to see one here if you're embarrassed to see one in San Aquino."

And so Harris Feinstein did not detail how California and the rest of the country, for that matter, might soon be at the hands of insane blackmailers with the power to create earthquakes whenever they wanted. Instead, he went back to the Department of the Interior and started to yell at the man who had transferred him to the FBI in the first place.

He yelled, although he knew his yelling corroborated the rumors of his insanity. He yelled, although he knew he was getting nowhere. He yelled because, dammit, he wanted to yell and the Department of the Interior was made up of idiots. If they weren't idiots in the first place, they wouldn't be in the Department of the Interior.

"If you'll listen to me," said the assistant something or other, Feinstein was not quite sure assistant to or of what, "you'd find that we do have someone interested in what you're talking about. His name is Silas McAndrew. He's on the street level floor. Here's his room number."

The assistant something or other handed Harris Feinstein a slip of paper. Feinstein left the office and walked down the long, incredibly long, corridors of the Department of the Interior. It was as if someone had designed the building to cow its visitors. Harris Feinstein was not about to be cowed.

It took him twenty-five minutes of following what he was sure was a non-system numbering system before he reached the number on the slip. He knocked.

"Come in," came the voice of Eastern nasality.

Harris Feinstein entered. He saw a small office with a bare light bulb burning furiously yellow above. He saw stacks of papers and cartons piled up, some of them twelve feet high. But he did not see the person who invited him in.

"I'm here," came a voice from behind a large paper carton which seemed about to surrender to an expansion of manila folders. "I'm Silas McAndrew."

Harris Feinstein looked around the carton. There was a man hunched over a typewriter, his jacket sprawled on his desk, his tie open, his shirt sleeves rolled up. He wore thick glasses. He smiled.

"No secretary." Then he offered his hand. It was a good handshake, not nervously strong or disengagingly weak. A solid, normal handshake with a very nice smile.

"I'm Harris Feinstein. I suppose you've heard of me from assistant whatever he is."

"Oh," said the young man with the honest, open face. "No, I haven't."

"Why did you say oh?"

"Because I know why you're here. Sit down."

"Thank God," said Feinstein, looking for a place to sit and settling for the top of a very large boulder. At least it looked like a boulder. Or a piece of one. It was not dirty, however.

"Okay," said Harris Feinstein. "What are we going to do?"

"Well, first tell me why you're here."

"You said you knew why I was here?"

Silas McAndrew lowered his eyes to his typewriter. "Uh, yeah. Let me straighten that out for you, Mr. Feinstein. I'm sort of the department that handles the unusual cases and what I meant by I know why you're here, was I know upstairs didn't exactly get along with you, right?"

"Oh," said Feinstein.

"But go ahead. Tell me your story. I'm all ears. Maybe I can help you."

"I hope so, but I doubt it," said Feinstein. He glanced briefly out the dusty window which rested on a humming air conditioner and then he began, sometimes looking down at his shoes, sometimes out the dusty window at sweltering Washington, sometimes just looking off, out into space somewhere, because he was sure he would meet another rebuff. What he was saying was that there was a real threat to America. His story didn't take very long. "So that's it. You can now file me away under assorted cranks and nuts. And thank you."

Harris Feinstein began to rise, until he felt a hand on his arm. Silas McAndrew stared at him, a piercing, questioning gaze. McAndrew looked different from when Feinstein had first entered the office. Now his well-tanned face had whitened and the probing showed fear.

"Don't go, Mr. Feinstein. Continue."

"Well, that's it."

"Not quite, Mr. Feinstein," McAndrew said. "You know, I'm a geologist. I get the geology and environment nuts. I wish you were one of them. I desperately wish you were. But I don't think so. Fact is, I believe you."

"Why should you? Nobody else did."

"Because I am a geologist," McAndrew said. "I don't have to tell you that California is earthquake country. Every year, the earthquakes number in the tens of thousands. Sure, mostly small and no damage, but all recordable. One of the things we do around here, Mr. Feinstein, is keep a map of where earthquakes occur. You've seen them. Pointy pins pressed into a map. In the last year or so, the frequencies all seem to have changed. I've been wondering why for the past six months. Now I know. Someone's been tampering with nature. Someone's been experimenting."